“Now we’re in the limelight with this weird, narrow window to attain exposure and money and visibility, and every trans woman who can needs to try and get a piece. “

— Hari Nef

“I’ve heard more than one trans person say that it’s like the best of times and the worst of times. It’s troubling the ways in which we’re being offered these opportunities. I think the only way that’s going to happen is through gainful employment.”

— Zackary Drucker

“I feel like people are seeing something come to light that they always knew was there, but it made their lives so much safer and less complicated to not address it, and society wasn’t addressing it ... people feel really powerless with the shift away from this binary way of seeing, being, loving, etc., that has been so rigid.”

— Hari Nef

“It’s like we have these internal spaces where we self identify, and everybody has a very unique perception of their own gender. I think queer and trans people are more likely to express it because we’ve already crossed that threshold, laid down whatever semblance of cis or heterosexual privilege we may have had. But we all have our own complex gender.”

— Zackary Drucker

“We need to separate the idea that gender is linked up to your body, and when society at large is more receptive to the idea of people choosing and proclaiming their own idea of their identity then I don’t think transition will be necessary. In an ideal world we wouldn’t need it.”

As a society, we’re waking up to the idea that gender identity doesn’t fit into two neat, blue and pink boxes, but rather exists on a spectrum that might not always mirror the biological body. Perhaps nowhere is the notion of gender fluidity being more tangibly explored than in the fashion industry, where designers are increasingly creating collections that blur the boundaries between boys and girls. There’s a growing curiosity, but this space is fraught, and though it’s in the zeitgeist today, trans is most certainly not just a trend. We’re parsing out the complexities of identity and diving headfirst into a new frontier.

We gathered Zackary Drucker and Hari Nef to discuss their own experiences as transgender icons coming to fame amid a new era of pop culture trans narratives. A co-producer of the groundbreaking show Transparent, Drucker is a celebrated artist whose repertoire over the past 10 years has explored notions of gender and identity, gracing the Whitney Biennial and MoMA PS1. Nef, a recent Columbia graduate and actress who appears in the upcoming season of Transparent, initially made waves as the first openly trans model signed by powerhouse IMG Models. Together, they examine the traps of mounting visibility, the vital importance of community, and the challenges of breaking down the binary.

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“Now we’re in the limelight with this weird, narrow window to attain exposure and money and visibility, and every trans woman who can needs to try and get a piece. “

— Hari Nef

“I’ve heard more than one trans person say that it’s like the best of times and the worst of times. It’s troubling the ways in which we’re being offered these opportunities. I think the only way that’s going to happen is through gainful employment.”

— Zackary Drucker

“I feel like people are seeing something come to light that they always knew was there, but it made their lives so much safer and less complicated to not address it, and society wasn’t addressing it ... people feel really powerless with the shift away from this binary way of seeing, being, loving, etc., that has been so rigid.”

— Hari Nef

“It’s like we have these internal spaces where we self identify, and everybody has a very unique perception of their own gender. I think queer and trans people are more likely to express it because we’ve already crossed that threshold, laid down whatever semblance of cis or heterosexual privilege we may have had. But we all have our own complex gender.”

— Zackary Drucker

“We need to separate the idea that gender is linked up to your body, and when society at large is more receptive to the idea of people choosing and proclaiming their own idea of their identity then I don’t think transition will be necessary. In an ideal world we wouldn’t need it.”